English translation of narratives
I was feeling like everyone was looking at me in the street. I felt safe wearing the mask for Covid because I was hiding my features. Everyone seemed to be checking me out. I had a constant thought if they bothered or talked to a friend of mine. My observation had been sharpened, though my interpretation may have been much biased now.
I was surprised when the psychologist first asked me how I felt. Does my feeling count too, I thought. Somehow then I realised that I had not been equal for so many years in relation to other people.
Forgiveness is not a social construct but a religious one. I understand those who turned to religion after what they committed. There, at least they can find forgiveness. There at least they can look for acceptance. Can man survive if he doesn't have acceptance?
Conceit, selfishness, I judged everybody, I felt I knew. And now I feel so lucky to realise that I was observing everything from a privileged position, how easily I judged the bad guy because I was the good guy, that's what I thought.
I have the feeling that people are watching me and trying to understand if I'm thinking right now about what I did, the people I hurt. They imagine that even though so many years have passed, it is the only thing that concerns me 24 hours a day. For to them I am not another man, the only quality I have is that of a criminal.
I have failed as a citizen. Stigma can significantly reduce a man's sense of worth.
I was thinking that at some point I would see a poster or a graffiti which refers to me. I was scared to go and talk to people.
I kept thinking that they were checking me out and looking to see that from my movements and my appearance they would confirm or not what they knew.
I was trying to observe if after two of my acquaintances saw me, they would later whisper something to each other about me. I felt constantly the focus of a silent attention. I felt like I was being seen as dirty. I avoided touching people, I didn't know how they would interpret it.
They came and they said, "Go away” and after I went further, they came and they found me and they bullied me again. What is the scope I can exist, I asked them. The other one told me "Change city", "Change country". I was even bullied two years later on the street.
You no longer have a name, your name is replaced by the crime you committed for the rest of your life. You're not George, you're the one who...
When someone gets angry with you and you have an argument, they can throw your past in your face when they run out of arguments.
They jump to conclusions without knowing you. After it got out a lot of people looked at me differently. Some people send me and curse me, wish me cancer, tell me they were fucking my mother, threaten me.
I always try to show that I'm not the same person anymore, but you ask yourself, Was I, and now I am, or did I not try to limit myself to go beyond certain limits?
I felt safe not looking happy. I felt people would go triggered if they saw me happy.
Every experience is a blessing. I feel lucky that in these years I learned myself and had time to think, to read, to study. I was reading about what people might be feeling, what I might have caused them. I wanted to know. I was reading about how I can emotionally rehabilitate those I hurt. But I realised I was never going to get that chance. Because that is how our societies are built. Fuck this progress. So many years and they don't even apply techniques that the Maori used to deal with conflict. How can I make amends? with my punishment; An eye for an eye to this day. This is our progress. And I wish that would work, too.
This life can be treated as a temporary existence of indefinite time, and what hope and dreams can a man have in such a condition? Like in The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. I cried when I read it. When people do not know the day of their discharge, they live in an existence-without a future and without a purpose.
So many, many times have I begged that there might be a punishment that would make me free, that would enable me to live. Every day I think about how I could make it up to you. But it also needs acceptance from the other side and there is nothing I can do. But I wish I had the chance to do anything. But I have lost all hope when I see that people are accused in trying to make up for doing it utilitarily. Perhaps it is utilitarian to seek forgiveness.
People knew I was incarcerated, but they didn't see me that way because when I got out, I went to school, set up a reintegration group, helped free of charge with various cases in prison, participated in church and community events.
Look, of course I tried to identify the positives through what came out.
I'm not afraid of punishment anymore. I have nothing to lose anymore because I have nothing. I'm only afraid of people. Only them are able to hurt me. Whereas animals, if you show them your love, they return it, they don't care what your story is. I wonder if they would love me if they knew what I've done.
Of course I feel they treat me with hatred. But people justify their behavior through their own terrible experiences, you know... so did I.
I mean, no one trusted me for a long time. I mean even trusting me, you know, taking my daughter and being at family events, the element of trust was gone, whenever I would show up and be around, it would be uncomfortable because I didn't know if they wanted me there and even if they did, I knew they couldn't trust me to be alone in their house, so it was tough.
They see you as a lesser human.
I felt my punishment as redemption. That's how it felt then. That I will be punished and at least that will ease the pain of the people I hurt with my actions.
I felt like a pinata that everyone wanted to hit ... Like I'm going to get sweets out of me.
I can't enjoy the same social gatherings, a drink, a walk. I'm afraid someone will know what I've done and look at me curiously, comment on me. I would spoil the fun, and I don't want to.
Society is the saddest place I've ever been.